134 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



much less prominent, but this is accounted for by the wear- 

 ing off of the ends of the feathers. 



Female Adult (Autumn- Winter Plumage)}- Upper parts 

 black, with narrow irregular bars and mottlings of rufous, 

 and a buff spot at the tip of most of the feathers (Plate VI. 

 Figs. 2 and 3) ; chest-feathers narrowly and often irregularly 

 barred with rufous and black, and usually more or less tipped 

 with buff (Plate VI. Figs. 10 and 11). The rest of the 

 under parts are dark chestnut mottled and barred with 

 black, or black barred with chestnut. The typical white- 

 spotted form differs, of course, in having the feathers of the 

 under parts widely tipped with white. 



This plumage is retained throughout the autumn and 

 winter ; in early spring the feathers of the summer plumage 

 begin to appear, and by the end of April or the beginning 

 of May the change is complete. In some individuals many 

 of the chestnut and black autumn-winter feathers on the 

 chest, sides, and flanks, are not renewed, but change their 

 pattern without a moult, as will be fully explained below. 



Female Adult (Summer Plumage). 



a. Feathers of the Upper Parts. 



So far as I have been able to ascertain from examining 

 a large number of specimens, the summer feathers of the 

 upper parts, that is to say, of the mantle, scapulars, inner 

 wing-coverts, back, and rump are always attained by moult, 

 and never by change of pattern. The summer moult of 

 these parts is very complete, and the transformation from 

 the autumn-winter plumage very remarkable. Every female 

 assumes the summer plumage ; and though all the different 

 types closely resemble one another in their breeding dress, 



1 I have, of course, here described the commonest or buff-spotted form of the 

 female in autumn plumage. In the most extreme examples of the red form the 

 buff spots at the ends of the feathers of the upper parts are absent, and this is 

 also the case in the much rarer black form. In the buff-barred form from the 

 south and west of Ireland the terminal buff spot takes the form of a marginal 

 bar, and the feathers are practically indistinguishable from the breeding or 

 summer plumage. It may possibly transpire that in the south of Ireland, the most 

 southerly point of this bird's range, the female retains her breeding plumage 

 throughout the year, but this seems very unlikely. 



